Tim Makris: Bipartisan agreement can be hailed as national model

Published 5:46 pm, Wednesday, April 3, 2013

On Wednesday, the Connecticut legislature voted to pass the most comprehensive gun legislation in the nation. On behalf of many of the families in Newtown, I'm writing to say thank you.

Our elected officials, many who stood beside us in those earliest dark days after December 14th, voted their consciences Wednesday, passing what many are reporting as the most comprehensive gun legislation in the country.

As supporters of the Second Amendment, they were able to separate the right of responsible gun owners from the excesses that have become commonplace in our culture.

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The law would require new state-issued eligibility certificates for the purchase of any rifle, shotgun or ammunition; mandate that offenders convicted of any more than 40 weapons offenses register with the state; require universal background checks for the sale of all firearms; and substantially expand the state's existing ban on assault weapons.

While it did not include a complete ban on the ownership of high-capacity magazines, as we hoped it would, it did include a ban on the future sale of those same magazines with more than 10 bullets and require registration and a ban against loading magazines with more than 10 bullets except at an individual's home or a shooting range.

As the Executive Director of Sandy Hook Promise, an organization that was created in Newtown by some of the community members in the hours after the shooting, I am encouraged to see a bipartisan agreement that can be hailed as a model for the nation.

Sandy Hook Promise has a two-part mission: first, to support those affected by the tragedy and help the community heal and second, to support comprehensive solutions to make our country safe from similar acts of violence.

The organization promotes a renewed national dialogue around issues of mental health, school safety, and gun responsibility that respects the rights that the Second Amendment bestows on individuals.

We work with many of the families who lost children and spouses at Sandy Hook on that terrible December day.

Our community was devastated by the shootings, but our faith in God and the power of love in our town, kept us together as we've struggled to aid the surviving families and children and make sense of this immense tragedy.

Sandy Hook Promise was created, in part, to advocate for new innovative solutions to the problem of gun violence in the fields of gun safety, mental health, school safety and community.

While we are working on all those fronts, including introducing the Sandy Hook Promise Innovation Initiative in Silicon Valley last month, legislative policy still plays a crucial role in this process and we are grateful for the legislators of Connecticut for standing up and doing their part.

It will take all of us, working together, to solve the problem of gun violence in our communities. But thanks to a legislature who put aside partisan differences to do just that yesterday, we have taken a step closer to that future.

On behalf of every parent who hopes to see their children grow into happy, healthy adults, we thank them.